Was the Quran burned after Muhammad’s death?

There is a sister I know, who claims that the burning of the Quran was a political move. She insists the motive was to govern the growing faith. She feels we do not have evidence that refutes her position. In other words the original copies of the Quran were burnt and the versions we have are somewhat edited. I am at a loss. I usually change the subject. She also says the Prophet asked everyone to be educated so there were multiple copies subject to change. I have not read anything to support her argument. However, I am not a scholar. Is there any meticulous evidence that would refute her thinking?

Yes we have an argument against her! The Quran itself. It says that God vows to preserve it Himself just as He revealed it Himself. See verse 15:9.

What is her evidence that the Quran was burned? Without authentic evidence, anybody can say anything about anything and anybody! Don’t pay attention to people who theorize. Insist on evidence and reasoning, or else you will easily be lost like millions are.

The only thing that comes to mind, is that maybe she is confused about what Uthmaan ibn `Affaan, may God have been pleased with him, what he did to the copies that people claimed were Quran. He compared each such copy against the Mus-haf (bound volume of the Quran) that the Prophet (PBUH) left with his wife Hafsa before he died. The Prophet (PBUH) also left another identical copy with his daughter Faatima, may God have been pleased with both. Uthmaan promptly burned all inauthentic copies claimed to be Quran but did not exactly match Hafsa’s Mus-haf. He had an authentic original to compare with!

She is a revert who calls herself a Qurani. One who upholds the Quran. She was with the Salafis for a minute. As Allah has promised us the Guardianship over corruption, I will use this ayat (verse) in the future. I do not like to argue (surprise, surprise).

Quranis take the other extreme. I dislike extremes. Islam is in the middle, but people just love to take one extreme or the other!

Quranis discard the Hadeeth altogether. That’s illogical, not to mention wrong. Because we could not know how to pray if it weren’t for the Hadeeth! It is also wrong because God orders us to obey the Prophet (PBUH), see verse 4:80. How can we do that if we don’t know what he said?!

Just because many hadeeths are unauthentic or problematic is no reason to dismiss all hadeeths! Rather, it’s reason to authenticate the Hadeeth, not just in its Sanad (attribution), but also in its Matn (content).

This entry was posted on Sunday, May 22nd, 2011 at 10:59 am and is filed under Authentication, Quran. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed.
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3 Responses to “Was the Quran burned after Muhammad’s death?”

And the scale of balance is? I appreciate a response. The synthesis of its Sanad and Matn. How did the likes of Bukhari, Muslim, et.al come to the same conclusion. I have to by defintion as a Muslim accept this understanding of Hadeeth.

They rated the narrator and found her trustworthy, so they rated the Hadeeth authentic. They did not try to critique the Matn.

Later scholars, such as At-Tirmizhi began to examine the Matn, but even they paid little attention to it.

The bottom line is that the Quran comes first, and only if the answer is not obvious in it do we seek the answer in the Hadeeth. That was the protocol which Mu`aazh ibn Jabal (RA) suggested when the Prophet (PBUH) was sending him to Yemen to be a judge and ruler. The Prophet(PBUH) was very pleased with Mu`aazh’s answer.